Adding a Diskless or Dataless Client to the NIM Environment

This procedure describes how to add diskless and dataless clients to the NIM environment by adding an entry for the client to the NIM database on the master. This provides NIM with the information required to satisfy boot requests from the client. However, resources for the diskless or dataless client machine must be initialized before the client will be able to successfully boot and configure. See "Initializing and Booting a Diskless or Dataless Machine" for more information. Diskless clients must mount all file systems from remote servers. Dataless clients can have paging space, as well as the /tmp and /home file systems on the local disk. Neither diskless nor dataless clients have a boot image on the local disk. Therefore, they must boot over the network.

Prerequisites

1. The NIM master must be configured, and the resources for diskless or dataless clients must be defined. See "Configuring the NIM Master and Creating Resources to Support Diskless and Dataless Clients Only ".
2. You must know the subnet mask, the default gateway for the client machine, and the default gateway for the NIM master.

From Web-based System Manager

1. From the NIM container, double-click on Add New Machine. The Add New Machine TaskGuide displays.
2. Follow the TaskGuide instructions to add a diskless or dataless client to the NIM environment.

From SMIT

1. To define a diskless or dataless client, enter the smit nim_mkmac fast path.
2. Specify the host name of the machine.
3. The SMIT screen displayed next depends on whether NIM already has information about the client's network. Supply the values for the required fields or accept the defaults. Use the help information and the LIST option to help you specify the correct values to define the client machine.

   Note: Prior to AIX Version 4.2, specific network objects must be defined in addition to the steps provided in this procedure. In this procedure, NIM networks are added automatically when needed.

From the Command Line

To define a diskless or dataless client, enter:

nim -o define -t Diskless/Dataless \
-a platform=PlatformType -a netboot_kernel=NetbootKernelType \
-a if1=InterfaceDescription -a net_definition=DefinitionName \
-a ring_speed1=Speedvalue -a cable_type1=TypeValue \
-a iplrom_emu=DeviceName MachineName

Note: For detailed attribute information, see the descriptions of diskless and dataless clients in "NIM Machines".

Example 1:

To add the diskless client with the host name diskless1 to the NIM environment with the following configuration:

host name=diskless1
platform=rspc
kernel=up
network type=ethernet
subnet mask=255.255.240.0
default gateway=gw1
default gateway used by NIM master=gw_master
cable type=bnc
network boot capability=yes (no emulation needed)

enter the following command sequence:

nim -o define -t diskless -a platform="rspc" \
-a netboot_kernel="up" -a if1="find_net diskless1 0" \
-a cable_type1="bnc" \
-a net_definition="ent 255.255.240.0 gw1 gw_master" \
diskless1

Example 2:

To add the dataless client with the host name dataless1 to the NIM environment with the following configuration:

host name=dataless1
platform=rs6k
netboot_kernel=up
network type=token ring
subnet mask=255.255.225.0
default gateway=gw2
default gateway used by NIM master=gw_master
ring speed=16
network boot capability=no (use emulation on a diskette)

enter the following command sequence:

nim -o define -t dataless -a platform="rs6k" \
-a netboot_kernel="up"  -a if1="find_net dataless1 0" \ 
-a ring_speed1="16" \
-a net_definition="tok 255.255.225.0 gw2 gw_master" \
-a iplrom_emu="/dev/fd0" dataless1

Notes:

1. Prior to AIX Version 4.2, specific network objects must be defined in addition to the steps provided in this procedure. In this procedure, NIM networks are added automatically when needed.
2. If the find_net keyword in the if attribute causes NIM to successfully match a network definition to the client definition, the net_definition attribute is ignored.